Poultry has been handled for many years by transporting live birds to processing facilities. Originally, transportable chicken coops were provided that were typically formed of wire or wooden lattice construction throughout with heavy wood rectangular frames. It has always been necessary for poultry transportation devices to have maximum ventilation and sufficient structural rigidity to accommodate the weight of the live animals in the coops or crates and also to withstand the heavy duty movement of the articles over conveyer belts, on trucks, etc. Originally, the devices were, in effect, transportable coops having self-contained individual coops that could be stacked one above the other during transportation.
Eventually, heavy duty poultry transport coops were formed of plastic structures consisting of a light weight and high impact synthetic plastic material, such as polyethylene or polypropylene. Again, the coops were comprised essentially of a plurality of sidewalls joined to generally planar upper ceiling and lower floor structures to define a full enclosure for the poultry. Again, it was necessary to provide doors or hinged lids to enable access to the interior of the coops for loading and unloading the poultry.
More recently, module systems have been provided wherein the modules are comprised of a plurality of cavities, i.e. twelve to fifteen. Discrete drawers are provided for each of the compartments or cavities of the module. With this design, the top that was necessary in the chicken coop to provide a fully contained structure is omitted. The module sections serve to form a surface on which the drawers can be seated and the bottom of one surface also serves as a top to confine the birds in the drawers.
Poultry transport involves the transportation of various sized birds. In particular, a drawer adapted to transport a turkey must be higher than the drawer required to transport a chicken. Typically, six to eight birds are placed in each drawer.
The use of drawers as distinct from coops by its nature provides a less durable structure. The coops are fully confined articles having a structural integrity upon all six sides. Conversely, the drawer having an open top has only structural support of the four sides and the bottom. As a result, the heavy duty handling of drawers presently in use has led to a relatively short useful life of each drawer.
In addition, the various sized birds that must be transported in drawers has resulted in dedication of a particular size drawer to a particular bird. The drawers designed to accommodate chickens will necessarily be one size and the drawers designed to transport and store turkeys will be another size.
Further, the drawers now in use, whether for the transport of chicken or turkey, are subjected to a considerable variety of transport situations. The drawers must be capable of being transported over land in a truck or other moving vehicle with a plurality of other drawers, usually in a module. In addition, the drawers must be capable of individual movement, usually over a conveyer system from the arrival at the processing site to the actual processing assembly line.